The Internet of Things: how going “smart” is altering the world of work

The Internet of Things or IoT is the internetworking of smart devices and the connectivity that enables them to collect and exchange data. Meanwhile, digitalisation is changing the architecture of work. In this second of two guest blogs, labour expert and activist, Auret van Heerden reflects on the potential advantages and disadvantages of both. Is “big data” leading to a brave new world or a dystopian future? You decide.

When you consider the potential scale and scope of data streams that make up the Internet of Things you begin to realise why some refer to “big data” like a belief system. Sensors that capture motion, temperature and light have become almost ubiquitous thanks to the smartphone and other technology.

Smartphones are the little wonders that allow your phone to record your steps, your sleep, your location via GPS and even changes in your altitude. They are also very good at recording eye movement and can tell exactly what you are looking at and how you are reacting to it.

Given that our interaction with the world, including at work, is increasingly mediated by the screens of our phones, tablets, laptops and terminals of some sort, the sensors embedded in those devices record an enormous amount of data about us. That includes what we are doing, thinking and feeling.

Harvesting personal data

Right now, while public awareness is certainly growing, we often still have very little idea of just how much data is being collected and by whom.

How many of the applications on our phones are harvesting data about where we are and what we are doing? How is that being combined with data from other sources – our browsing and our purchases, online and at the supermarket – and of our consumption of food, drink, media and every other consumer good that makes us what we are?

Sensors have become so cheap and common that they literally surround us and fill in the gaps between all the other digital fingerprints we leave in our daily lives.

As our lives become more and more digital, from our kitchen appliances and children's toys to our cars and offices we increase and expand the data trails we leave. It all goes into the stream of data that we generate without our active agreement, and about which we know extremely little.

It is now possible for the data stream to seamlessly document all the biometric activity of our waking and sleeping hours. It can build up a record that can be mathematically processed to predict what we will do next, based on millions of bits of data from similar situations in the past.

While this can be extremely helpful in predicting behaviours that may affect our health and safety, or lead to a mistake at work, or a traffic accident, it also presents concerns. It can predict what we might buy, read, eat, say or feel. In short, our data stream will soon know more, infinitely more, than we do about what we have done, are doing, and will do.

It is not only the obviously digital appliances that are collecting our data. Beyond the multitude of screens in our lives – our furniture, our clothes, our shoes and even our toilets will add to the data stream.

Recording productive and unproductive activity

Monitoring keystrokes and calls (for Call Centre workers) is commonplace already. Soon all office furniture and equipment, machinery and tools will contain sensors that indicate who has been doing what, when and how at work. Those digital records will not only record productive (and unproductive) activity but also enable an employer or organisation to conduct preventive maintenance, reorder supplies, predict breakdowns and optimise production.

We – and line managers – will increasingly manage our work via the company App that gives access to all our HR data, our documents and our colleagues. That may make the “work experience” a lot more convenient but it will also add more data to the stream.

Every movement of every factory worker will be recorded by the sensors in their chairs, tables, machines and wearable devices and that data will be streamed to supervisors, technicians, suppliers and buyers. For good or bad, this has been a battleground for workers who drive for years, with telematics making it possible to monitor driving hours, distances and styles.

So, what are the implications for rights at work?

Privacy issues

The issue of privacy has been debated ever since cameras and sensors were introduced into workplaces, but the amount of data collected in the increasingly digital workplace is not properly understood, let alone the uses that data is put to.

• The hours and wages of workers could be automatically tracked in the data stream, and if properly used, could ‘theoretically’ prevent problems of overwork or underpay
• The tone and pitch of voices could be monitored to indicate levels of stress, tension, anger or violence.
• Verbal and other forms of harassment could be discerned in the data stream.
• The biometric data of employees could be analysed in real time to detect levels of fatigue, health problems and even medical emergencies.
• Fear, anxiety or stress experienced by employees could be identified and addressed before it reaches levels that may be harmful to the employee or their colleagues.

However, the word ‘theoretically’ should be emphasised.

So far there is limited evidence of benevolent workplaces and more of exploitation – think claims of ‘labour theft’ around Amazon’s Mechanical Turk, for example, or allegations of hospitality companies sacking workers who are not ‘smiley’ enough.

If not careful, IoT could easily become the 21st century’s version of Frederick Winslow Taylor’s Principles of Scientific Management – time and motion writ large, but in the digital space.

And as recent media reports of abuses within warehousing jobs such as Sports Direct have revealed, do we honestly believe that even our toilet and rest breaks should be monitored and regulated for the benefit of employment efficiencies?

 Read Auret's first blog on how digitalisation and automation are changing the architecture of work.